Deliberate practice exercises provide trainees and students opportunities to develop a more multicultural, intersectional approach to psychotherapy and hone their own personal therapeutic style.
These exercises present role-playing scenarios in which two trainees act as a client and a clinician, switching back and forth under the guidance of a supervisor. The clinician improvises appropriate and authentic responses to client statements organized into three difficulty levels―beginner, intermediate, and advanced―that reflect common client questions and concerns.
Each of the first 12 exercises focuses on a single skill, such as developing cultural self-awareness and cultural humility, exploring cultural implications and explanations of clients’ concerns, responding to resistance, and repairing culturally based ruptures in the working alliance. A comprehensive mock therapy exercise follows in which these essential skills are brought together into a single multicultural therapy session.
Step-by-step instructions guide participants through the exercises, identify criteria for mastering each skill, and explain how to monitor and adjust difficulty. Guidelines to help trainers and trainees get the most out of training are also provided.
To demonstrate how deliberate practice can be fully integrated into a professional curriculum, this series features exercises developed and refined within the clinical training curriculum at the Sentio online/hybrid marriage and family therapy (MFT) therapist training program in California, which is where we started developing this series. These exercises, which have been tested at clinical training sites around the world, are used to enhance clinical outcomes within the first hybrid MFT program approved by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences to fully integrate deliberate practice into its entire curriculum. By integrating these models into its hybrid MFT program in California, Sentio University demonstrates that therapist training graduate programs can use deliberate practice to bridge the gap between theory and clinical mastery through repetitive, feedback-informed practice to support the development of modern, outcome-focused clinicians.
Jordan Harris, PhD, LMFT-S, LPC-S, is a former American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT) Minority Fellow and AAMFT Minority Fellowship Mentor. He’s consulted on various projects around deliberate practice and issues of diversity. Currently he works in private practice and runs the blog www.jordanthecounselor.com, dedicated to all things deliberate practice and practice building.
Joel Jin, PhD, is an assistant professor of clinical psychology at Seattle Pacific University (SPU). At SPU's clinical psychology PhD program, he teaches graduate courses on foundational clinical interventions for psychotherapy, brief psychodynamic therapy, psychopathology, psychological assessment, and understanding cultural differences and diversity. His research lab investigates the impact of perfectionism and stigma on mental health and wellbeing. His research team tests how mindfulness-based and compassion-focused interventions can help students of the global majority thrive.
Sophia Hoffman, PhD, is the Assistant Program Director and the Director of Clinical Training at the combined School-Clinical Child PsyD Program at Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology at Yeshiva University. Dr. Hoffman works with children, adolescents, and their families at Lifespan Therapists of Brooklyn. She specializes in working with challenging behaviors in early childhood and consulting with parents about how those behaviors affect school experiences. Dr. Hoffman has extensive experience helping families manage childhood trauma and the subsequent challenging behaviors expressed at home and at school. Cultural humility is at the center of her practice.
Selina Phan is a doctoral candidate in the School-Clinical Child Psychology Program at Ferkauf School of Psychology. She received a dual bachelor's degree in Psychology and Behavior & Health from Boston University. As a home visitor, Selina provided community-based case management and parent training services to low-income families with children from birth to 5 years old. Her clinical interests are in childhood anxiety, depression, ADHD, trauma, and parent management.
Tracy A. Prout, PhD, is associate professor of psychology at the Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology at Yeshiva University. She teaches evidence-based psychodynamic psychotherapy in the School-Clinical Child Combined Doctoral Program, supervises advanced graduate students in the psychodynamic psychotherapy practicum, and leads the psychodynamic psychotherapy lab at Ferkauf. Dr. Prout is principal investigator for several studies related to Regulation Focused Psychotherapy for Children (RFP-C) and supervises all graduate research assistants who work on these projects. Dr. Prout coleads IMPACT Psychological Services, an integrative, group private practice, with locations in Beacon and Mamaroneck, New York serving children, teens, families and adults.
Tony Rousmaniere, PsyD, is president of Sentio University marriage and family therapy (MFT) program in California. He led the development of the online/hybrid MFT program, which is the first MFT therapist training program approved by the California Board of Behavioral Science for MFT licensure that fully integrates deliberate practice. Dr. Rousmaniere is the author/coeditor of many books on psychotherapy training. He is also the executive director of the Sentio Counseling Center, which is Sentio MFT program’s guaranteed practicum site where students provide sliding-scale online therapy in California, and past president of the American Psychological Association’s Division 29.
Alexandre Vaz, PhD, is chief academic officer of Sentio University marriage and family therapy (MFT) program in California. This innovative online/hybrid California MFT degree was the first approved by the California Board of Behavioral Science for MFT licensure to fully integrate deliberate practice into its curriculum to ensure superior clinical outcomes. He is also director of clinical training for the Sentio Counseling Center, which is Sentio MFT program’s guaranteed practicum site where students provide low-cost online couples therapy in California. Dr. Vaz is the author/coeditor of many books on deliberate practice and psychotherapy training.
